


Song of the sea

by Demon_Cookie101



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Post Game, eventually, friendship?, probably
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-10
Updated: 2016-04-10
Packaged: 2018-06-01 10:32:55
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6514564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Demon_Cookie101/pseuds/Demon_Cookie101
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dave wants more music variety. Eridan's not sure he's up to this sort of thing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Song of the sea

He sits his ass down in front of you without any form of preamble, startling you out of your brooding. Well, you’re not _really_ brooding, you’re just thinking really hard over why exactly you were allowed to live again. Nothing big. It’s just you after all. No one important.

But this human. The weird one with the mutant eyes and the dumb stoic expression. He just sits his ass down in front of you and looks at you expectantly. And you know he hasn’t said anything yet because his lips look as dry as anything and you haven’t heard anything break the still silence that’s gathered around you over the past… however long you’ve been sitting there. Hour maybe. There’s a book abandoned to your right, it’s plotline is hideous and the characters lack any form of depth. You don’t even know why you picked it up, ugh.

The human, Strider, Dave, whatever his name is, shifts suddenly, leaning forward towards you. “What sort of vocal range do you have?” He speaks quickly, like he needs to get his words out in one go or he’s not going to be able to get a say in again. It takes a second before you focus on him enough to process what he said, and when you do, you scowl. “If you’re lookin’ f’ someone to do a bit of tra la singin’ shit for you go find someone else.”

“Fish princess doesn’t fancy sparing a few tunes, twitchy fins, hence why I’m coming to you. I’ve heard your kind’s got a pretty decent vocal range.” His shades could almost be mirrors, and you can see your scowl reflected in them. You don’t like being stared at for too long, and he’s staring now, even behind his shades.  
“Well you’ve heard wrong. It’s only those that pursue the ideology of musical talent that sing. Not me.”  
His expression doesn’t so much as twitch, despite the fact that you’re baring a mouthful of fangs at him. It’s a bit unnerving to see yourself do it. You look…

You don’t really know what you look like. You liked tired, but angry and hard and defensive and it makes your close your mouth over pointed teeth and study him instead.  
“Feffles said you sing.”  
“She’s lyin’,” you say immediately, though you can’t help but remember the few times you’ve sung sea shanties and old melodies to her to help her calm down when you were younger and not as stupid or irrationally idiotic.  
“Captor backed her up.” That makes you sigh, rolling your eyes. Of course. Of course Sollux would, especially if Dave asked. Though you’re not sure whether it would be to get back at you or just because he has your memories and knows it already.

“I’m not singin’ for you. I haven’t sung in a long time, Strider, so you’re wastin’ your time.”  
“Still. I want to hear you.”  
“Why?”  
He cocks his head to the side a bit, sort of like the birds that wake you up at ass o’clock with their stupid ass warbling outside your window. “Because I’ve only heard you sneer and act all defensive and angry. And I’ve heard princess hum a few tunes and it got me thinking. A vocal range like yours would produce some epic music, okay. I want to get in on that, sample that shit, dick around with it and see whether I’m hitting a jackpot or just setting myself up for fun times in a lame ass kiddy pool.” He’s trying to push your buttons, goading you into doing it. You can tell.

“How do I know you won’t just make an utter mockery of me?” You demand, memories of the one time you sang and Vriska heard you coming to mind. She’d mocked you for weeks, taking well past what you thought was the limits for black teasing. Apparently it wasn’t, but you don’t really know any better so you don’t say anything.

Dave stares at you, one brow arched up. “Do I look like the kinda guy to take a dive at any musical talent when I have the ability to warp it to my liking? Fuck no dude, I ain’t about that sort of crap. I was gonna make a mockery of you, it would involve several birds, and fish and a skillet.” He shifts again, fingers moving to drum out a beat against his knees. Your fin twitches and you just frown at him.

Eventually, when you don’t say anything more, he sighs and leans back in the chair, crossing his arms over his chest. “How about I make you a deal.” You hate deals. They never went well for you. Of course, most of the deals you made were with Vriska and she seemed to want to follow her ancestor’s line in backstabbery.

“What kin’a deal.”  
“You sing for me, just once, and I’ll keep darlin’ Karkles off your ass for the foreseeable future.” That… was a pretty good deal, in retrospect. Karkat was… not very happy with you. You’ve figured its continuation from what you did in the game, but he’s forgiven Gamzee and you’re just fucking confused out the wazoo. You didn’t even kill him, and he was the one who broke off the pact! Well, you did kill Kanaya, but she got her own revenge! Why should he still hate you.

Dave snaps his fingers in front of your nose, jerking you back to the here and now. “We got a deal, Ampora?”  
“Fine. One song.”  
“Unless I like your voice.”  
“What?” That’s not part of the deal. He grins at you, breaking his blank façade to do so.

“Unless I like your voice. Dude, I ain’t about to pass up some quality voice around here. My options are limited, as I only know two seadwellers and I don’t really fancy myself wanting to go meet some more.” You just looked at him, fins flat against your head.  
“That wasn’t part of the deal.”  
He waved a hand at you, brushing aside your words and against your will, you bristle like an angry purrbeast. What do humans call them? Oh yeah. Cats.

“It’s not like I’m going to exploit you for my mystical annoying needs now. I just want some good voice action going on so I can mix up some quality shit while in the meantime getting to piss off a few people.”

You could take the off chance that he doesn’t like your voice and won’t ask for another song and take him keeping Karkat off your back, or you could just leave it and listen to more snide comments and angry rants from someone you considered a very close friend.

“Fine.” The word slips from your lips without your say so, and your fins droop a little. You’re not one to back out on your word, but you can tell this isn’t going to be fun.

“What am I singin’?”  
He stands, gesturing for you to do the same and leads up down the halls of this giant hive stem and to his quarters. Rooms. Whatever they’re called. “Not here bro. we’ll do this in the privacy of a sound room so no one else can “make a mockery of you”, as you so eloquently put it.” You just roll your eyes at him, sighing as he leads you into a room with weird walls and a microphone. He gets you to put on headphones and sit down in the chair, well stool really, before he moves over to the small computer thing he’s got set up on a desk behind a glass panel. You know it’s not a proper sound booth, you’ve scoured the internet enough and seen enough music production videos to know that it’s not, but it’ll do for this room, and Dave probably knows what he’s doing. You hope he knows what he’s doing, and that he’s actually being serious here and isn’t just stringing you along to play your stupid singing for everyone to hear and make fun of you.

He doesn’t seem the type to do that, but what do you know.

“Just sing something you know.”  
“Alternian or Earthly?” You get an eyebrow raise for that and shrug, looking at him. “Do you want it to be understood, yeah or nah?”  
“Shit man, half the music today makes no fucking sense and that’s, most of the time at least, in American English. Not even English English with their pip pips and cheery-o’s and whatever other stereotype you wanna slap on that. Don’t even get me started on Australian English. Ever heard the words true blue shoved in a song?”

You have absolutely no idea what the fuck he’s talking about. And he probably knows about.

“Sad occasions with the song true blue okay. You alien folk will have to catch up on sometime.” He grins, quick and gone like lightning and you’re still confused but whatever.

“Just sing something you know.”

You sigh, but reach up to position the mic properly and adjust the headphones so that they’re not completely trapping your fins. It’s not very comfortable, but fins aren’t made to have things over them so you can deal for a bit.

It doesn’t take long to think of a song, in fact it takes longer for you to try and actually start singing than anything else. Dave sits patiently, but you can tell he’s probably getting impatient with you. You close your eyes, open your mouth and start to sing a melody you’ve known since you were hatched. It’s an old song, you’d even call it a sea shanty, but it’s more a story than a rowing chant.

You don’t like thinking about the story itself, but the song has always stuck with you.

You don’t open your eyes until a few seconds after the final note. You’ve tried not to listen to yourself sing, tried to get lost in the song like you’ve been able to do so many times before, but it’s harder to do that when you know someone’s listening. Sure you’ve sung it for Fef, but that’s different.

Dave’s expression surprises you when you finally open your eyes. He looks surprised, his brows high and his mouth slightly open and for a moment, you’re sure that your voice really is horrible and you’re worse than he thought.

Then he takes his shades off and stands up, coming around from the glass wall to stand in front of you.

You’ve taken the headphones off, holding them in your hands and ticking a claw against the plastic of the band as you look right back at him, waiting for the words, the mocking that will come.

Instead, he just runs his hands through his hair and turns in a circle, turning back to face you with the same surprised expression on his face. “Bro I am going to exploit your voice so bad we’re gonna be rolling in riches so shiny I’m gonna be called Midas.”

This human keeps knocking you for a loop and you’re not really liking that fact, but he’s not mocking you, so that’s a plus… right?

“The fuck are you goin’ on about?” You finally say, brow furrowed.  
“How do you not sing for a living. Your voice is like… I don’t even know. I need you on some slow earthly songs or something hella remixable because damn. Hot, _damn_.” He grins at you, shoving his hands in his pockets like he’s just shown you the secrets to the world and is expecting applause. You’re just confused. “What?”

Dave rolls his eyes. “I. want. To. Make. Music. From. Your. Voice.”

“But it’s not even that good.” You just know that your fins are violet as shit and probably wiggling now. How embarrassing. “Eridan. Shut up. That vocal range, I don’t even know how you got that low without any effort. Or that high. It didn’t even sound strained or too forced and it was gradual and gorgeous. Shut up, sit down, sing your heart out and let me record your voice. Please.”

He looks genuine. He looks so genuine and you want to believe him.

You really do.

“Eridan. I swear that I’m not gonna make fun of you.” He does look sincere. Very sincere. And maybe you like singing and you miss singing quietly to yourself in your hive and not having to be afraid that Vriska had bugged your hive and was mocking you again.

You sigh, putting the headphone back over your head and adjust it to not be squishing your fins as much.

“What do you want me to sing?”

**Author's Note:**

> I apologise if anyone takes insult. Nothing was meant as an insult. And yes I know what True Blue was used for in a memorable event. Many tears. Many. I was tempted to put A House Among the Gum Trees, but nah.
> 
> Thank you to everyone who has commented/kudos on any of my fics, your comments make my day!!


End file.
